Media’s Treatment of Clemens Shows It’s Not Just About Bonds

The media’s scrutiny of Roger Clemens proves that Barry Bonds is not the only one in the steroids spotlight.

The video and the pictures show many of the same scenes; a burly, over-sized man walking through hallways in unfamiliar clothing, the same chastened yet defiant look, much of the same rhetoric involving denials. This time it’s Roger Clemens’ turn in the steroids spotlight, and if this feels like something you’ve seen and heard before, that’s because it is. There’s the same shady personal trainer, the same federal investigators, there’s even Jose Canseco.

Both players stand accused of taking steroids or other performance-enhancing substances. Legally, both are in trouble for lying about it. Bonds is already under indictment and many speculate that Clemens soon will be. Both players have been discredited by the public and the media and will likely be locked out of the Hall of Fame.

There were many who thought things might be different. Back in 2006, when the storm around Barry Bonds was reaching its crescendo, many analysts on television and in print speculated openly that Bonds was being singled out as the face of the steroid era for reasons other than his transgressions. After all, there were others like Rafael Palmeiro, who famously wagged his finger at Congress, got his 3000^th hit, tested positive, and retired in shame. There were others such as Mark McGwire, who kept testosterone-like substance in his locker the season he hit 70 home runs. But the focus was especially on Bonds for several reasons

The first reason was that he was going after the most hallowed of all numbers in a game of numbers. No record in sports is as well-known as the career home run record. Just the mention of the number 715 brings about images of Aaron trotting around the bases, being slapped on the back by two strangers. Aaron had held the record since 1974, over 30 years, retiring with 755 home runs. Before that Babe Ruth, the most illustrious name in the history of baseball and perhaps in American sports culture, held the record with 714 for over 50 years. Ruth has been a beloved icon for generations, the George Washington of baseball’s Mount Rushmore. Aaron, with the fading of racial tensions in sports since the early 70s, has become another icon, lauded for his gentlemanly conduct and his consistency. If Ruth is beloved, Aaron is respected.

Bonds is neither, which leads to a second point; nobody really likes Barry Bonds. Certainly the media has no love for him. Bonds, for his part, seems to have graduated magna cum laude from the Bobby Knight/Bill Parcells Academy for Media Relations. He comes across as arrogant, rude, and worst of all for reporters, disdainful.

There’s a third factor with Bonds that is usually only hinted at and rarely spoken out loud; he’s black. But, the argument goes, so is Hank Aaron. I think what we’re talking about here are what are perceived by some to be white values; teamwork, loyalty, consistency. Bonds is, by all accounts, a bad teammate. Witness his fights with Jeff Kent, his aloofness, his insistence on setting himself apart from others. Aaron is generally regarded as an excellent teammate, a blue-collar guy who came to work every day and did his job without complaint. Bonds is seen as a number-hungry prima donna who took days off when he felt like it. Although he is black, Aaron personifies the values that white, blue-collar workers could identify with in a way they cannot with Bonds, who for many personifies today’s modern athlete for the worse. He’s thought of by some as an NBA player in an MLB uniform, a man more interested in his home runs and RBIs than his team’s wins and losses. And as the evidence has mounted, from his unprecedented late-career production to the grand jury testimony, Bonds has come to be regarded as the man who sold his, and baseball’s, soul.

Roger Clemens’ situation has almost none of the same elements as Bonds’. He has been lauded by teammates, fans and the media alike. He has been one of the faces of the greatest dynasty in recent baseball history. And while Clemens holds no records of the same stature as the career home run record Bonds now holds, he is generally regarded as one of the greatest pitchers of all times.

But the same sordid scenes that played out with Bonds have duplicated themselves with Clemens. The Clemens affair seems even more sordid, perhaps because Clemens has made his defense so public, bringing the images of bloody buttocks and used syringes to the public’s mind.

What becomes apparent now with Clemens is that it’s not the cheater, it’s the cheating. Baseball is a numbers sport and the common theme throughout the steroids era has been that numbers inflated through drugs are worthy of derision instead of admiration. Both Clemens and Bonds used performance-enhancing drugs to stave off age-induced decline, adding years of productivity not available without drugs, turning Hall of Fame-worthy career numbers into unprecedented totals. In the end these numbers were gained artificially, that’s what this issue is all about.

So now the steroids era has a second face, the white pitcher to go with the black slugger. What has brought Clemens and Bonds to this point has nothing to do with race and everything to do with their statures. They are, quite simply, two of the greatest baseball players who ever lived. Neither McGwire nor Sammy Sosa can approach their career achievements. There’s another reason they have been singled out; they’re still playing, or at least they were last season. There seems to be something especially angering to fans and the media about seeing these guys out there, artificially defying the aging processes that overtake us all. It almost feels as if they didn’t slink of the stage in shame the way the others did, the way they were supposed to. Instead, they came back year after year, adding to their numbers, symbolically wagging their finger at those who believe in the rules.